Salary Cuts: The Least Unsavory Option

Yesterday, our company's board of directors announced they would be cutting salaries by 10 percent across the board, effective next month. The news was sad, but given the employee-generated speculations about possible bureau closings or layoffs, most of us were relieved to receive the cuts instead.

"Everybody still has a job," our managing editor said as a preface to the bad news.

As a small paper committed to hyper-local coverage (for us, this is not just a buzz word; it's what we do), we were disappointed that, along with countless papers and news publications across the country, we had lost enough advertising revenue to make such dramatic measures necessary. Because of the nature of our business, it can sometimes take a little longer for us to feel the impact of a recessed economy, but we finally did. Many business closings in the area have had a direct effect on our advertising sales, and as the remaining ones cinch their belts, so do we.

The news came as a blow to me, who as a fresh-out-of-college cub reporter has nearly every dollar budgeted for specific and necessary purposes. Reporters don't make that much. Cub reporters make less. Cub reporters in an ailing economy make even less.

That said, I applaud my company for choosing salary cuts rather than layoffs. It would be at best difficult to manage on a staff any smaller than the one we already have. Although everyone here is bummed about smaller paychecks, we still feel like a team who can and will pull through this tough time together, instead of a decimated staff whose members pick up the slack for those laid off and wonder, "am I next?"

Of all the options a company could choose to mitigate lost revenue, I think a salary cut is the least unsavory. After all, we could have each taken five weeks of furlough, or been out a job entirely.